Page 198 - Guildhall Coverage Book 2020-21

7 November 2020

Opera Triple Bill: Wolf-Ferrari, Mascagni,

Donizetti review – sex, violence and

serious talent

4 / 5 stars

Guildhall School of Music and Drama, London, live stream
Three Florentine women have their moment in this stylish showcase of future opera stars

Olivia Boen and Tom Mole in Susanna’s Secret, part of Guildhall School’s Opera Triple Bill. Photograph: Mihaela
Bodlovic

Three one-act operas, three women: one who beats up her docile husband; one a prostitute who
dreams of unsullied love; one whose secret, how bad can it get, is that she smokes. The art form
has never shied from taxing subjects. In a stylish triple bill, Guildhall School of Music and Drama
has made Wolf-Ferrari’s Il segreto di Susanna (Susanna’s Secret), Mascagni’s Zanetto and
Donizetti’s Rita (Two Men and a Woman), each set in Florence, speak to a contemporary
audience.

Conducted by Dominic Wheeler, directed by Stephen Medcalf and involving small casts, a sizable
orchestra and a full production team – I counted nearly a hundred names – this classy evening of
sex and violence ingeniously negotiates the limits of social distancing. A double cast shares the
four livestreamed performances (last one 9 November, 7pm, free).

In Susanna’s Secret, two promising performers – soprano Olivia Boen and baritone Tom Mole,
both full of stage courage – played up the folly of a jealous husband presuming his innocent but
bored wife has a lover. Soprano Ella de Jongh and, in the title role, mezzo-soprano Jessica